ISLAMABAD: The Federal Government Employees Housing Foundation (FGEHF) is planning to appeal against an Islamabad High Court (IHC) verdict that has deprived a number of powerful bureaucrats and judges of the superior judiciary of plots in housing ventures located in sectors F-14 and F-15.

But until the order is suspended, set aside or upheld by the appellate forum, an FGEHF official told Dawn, those affected by the decision cannot claim refund or dispose of the provisional allotment letters issued to them.

The FGEHF had allotted one-kanal plots to 1,788 civil servants, public officials, officers from constitutional and autonomous bodies, as well as lawyers and journalists.

List of govt functionaries whose plots were cancelled by IHC verdict includes chief secretaries, SC judges

But on Oct 23, Justice Athar Minallah had declared the housing project illegal and subsequently, nearly 5,000 provisional allotment letters, issued to government functionaries such as provincial chief secretaries, inspectors general of police and several federal secretaries, have become redundant.

According to the foundation’s list, State Bank Governor Tariq Bajwa and Federal Ombudsman Syed Tahir Shahbaz, the chief commissioner for Afghan refugees and even the housing secretary – whose ministry controls the FGEHF – are on the long list of those hit by the IHC verdict.

From the superior judiciary, recipients of plots included Supreme Court Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan, Justice Faisal Arab, Justice Musheer Alam, Justice Tariq Masood, former chief justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali and his spouse Sindh High Court Justice Ashraf Jahan, retired Justice Amir Hani Muslim, retired Justice Khilji Arif Hussain, retired Justice Ejaz Chaudhry and retired Justice Iqbal Hameedur Rehman.

Justice Noorul Haq N. Qureshi of the Islamabad High Court, Justice Aminuddin Khan of the Lahore High Court and retired Justice Irshad Qaiser of the Peshawar High Court were also on the list.

Among the subordinate judiciary, the following district and sessions judges have lost their plots: Malik Nazir Ahmed, Khalid Mehmood Ranjha, Raja Jawad Abbas Hassan, Mohammad Bashir, Nisar Baig, Sohail Ikram, Syed Kausar Abbas Zaidi, Wajid Ali, Shahrukh Arjumand and Sohail Nasir from the Punjab Judicial Service.

The allotments made to additional district and sessions judges Kamran Basharat Mufti, Raja Khurram Ali Khan, Atta Rabbani, Raja Asif Mehmood, Pervaizul Qadir Memon, Rakhshanda Shaheen, Mohammad Azam Khan, Mohammad Adnan, Mohammad Jahangir Awan and Syed Faizan Haider have also been cancelled.

Other high-profile provisional allottees include Interior Secretary Arshad Mirza, Cabinet Division Secretary Nadeem Hassan Asif, CADD Secretary Nargis Ali Akbar Ghaloo, Sindh IG A.D. Khawaja, Punjab IG Arif Nawaz Khan, Balochistan IG Ahsan Mehbood, former KP IG Nasir Khan Durrani, Punjab Chief Secretary Zahid Saeed, KP Chief Secretary Mohammad Azam Khan, Sindh Chief Secretary Rizwan Memon, former Balochistan chief secretary Shoaib Mir, former finance secretary Waqar Masood Khan, former director general FIA Mohammad Aamlish, industries secretary Maroof Afzal, and acting petroleum secretary Jalal Sikandar Sultan, among others.

Among the law officers of the federal government, Additional Attorney General Afnan Karim Kundi, Deputy Attorney General Arshad Mehmood Kiani, Chaudhry Haseeb and Fazalur Rehman Niazi were also given provisional allotment letters.

Nazir Jawad, a legal adviser of the Ministry of Housing and Works, told Dawn that as per past policy, the Capital Development Authority used to develop plots for FGEHF, which were allotted to its members in order of their seniority.

He said that under the decision of the federal government, members of the housing foundation had the chance to obtain plots in developed sectors after paying the actual cost of the land and development charges. Since the foundation was a not-for-profit entity, it never charged extra from its members and this was the reason the FGEHF’s plots were priced lower than the market price.

However, the recent judgment has strictly barred FGEHF from acquiring land in Zone-I of the capital, which is meant for developed sectors only.

Former deputy attorney general Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri, on the other hand, said that in the light of judgment, certain categories that were not originally under the FGEHF domain, would not be able to get plots in future schemes.

According to him, lawyers, judges, journalists, employees of autonomous bodies and constitutional entities would not be able get plots in upcoming schemes.

He said that following the verdict, the only option FGEHF was left with was to purchase plots in upcoming schemes and sell them to employees of the federal government in accordance with the previous policy.

In the landmark judgment, Justice Minallah declared the housing ventures illegal, noting that approval for the proposed housing scheme in sectors F-14 and F-15 was granted by the prime minister of Pakistan without placing the proposal before the federal cabinet. As per the court verdict, such act “attracts the offence of corruption and corrupt practices as defined in section 9 of the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO), 1999.”

The judgment criticized the provisional allotment of plots to judges of the subordinate judiciary, observing that this would be a conflict of interest when the judges had to decide cases against the land acquisition.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2017